7:30 pm, Great Hall, GBPAC, Cedar Falls
Claudia Anderson, flute
Mendelssohn – A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Overture and selected Incidental Music
Lowell Liebermann – Flute Concerto [1992]
Prokofiev – Romeo and Juliet, Suite no. 2
Download concert [144mb]
Related post – As red as... [audio]
Related post – Wedding Marches
Related post – New music midwest
Photos – Shakespeare in Love
Symphony performance runs emotional gamut
by George F. Day
Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier
February 6, 2008
The theme for the evening, appropriate for the month of Valentine's Day, was 'Shakespeare in Love.' Two of the three works performed were musical reflections of dramas of love by the great playwright.
First on the bill was some of the incidental music Felix Mendelssohn created for 'A Midsummer Night's Dream.' The orchestra played the work with verve, quickly establishing a mood that was joyous and youthful.
Prokofiev's 'Romeo and Juliet' Suite no. 2 concluded the program. Originally conceived as the score for a ballet, the suite is a marvel of instrumentation. And this performance called attention to the superiority of several sections of the WCFSO – the brass, winds and strings. Particularly fine was Evan Smith's sonorous playing on the tenor saxophone.
A high point of the evening was the performance of Liebermann's Concerto for Flute, with [Claudia] Anderson. Both the score of this contemporary piece and Anderson's reading of it were electrifying. The work requires a virtuoso soloist to navigate its extremely challenging score. But Anderson was very much in charge of things from her tuneful pianissimo to the bold, lovely defiance that, to me, permeated the concerto. Her performance brought the audience to its feet for a wild prolonged ovation.
A consummate performer, she was not just a 'guest artist.' She has been orchestra's principal flutist for several years.
Note: All reviews are edited for length and spelling.